Deathscapes

Hamid Shamshiripour 15e - Anti-Shelter: arrested lives

Anti-Shelter: arrested lives

[imagecaption] SBS, ‘Inside Manus‘, 2017. ‘More than two years ago, most of us were recognised as genuine refugees, but we are still suspended in the middle of nowhere. There was no need to imprison us in this isolation for four long, wasted years as we have committed no crime. A day is like a decade in this gruesome place.’ – Mohammad Imran, writer and activist formerly detained in PNG, recently resettled in the US [/imagecaption]

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‘Australia’s offshore holding camps for refugees and asylum seekers, located on its neighbouring Pacific territories of Papua New Guinea and Nauru, signify, in conceptual, spatial, and legal terms, as an architecture that is the very antithesis of shelter: they are spaces designed to engender fear, compound uncertainty, and maximize a sense of exposure to danger.’

People detained on Manus Island and Nauru have had their lives suspended for more than four years. Several men left behind pregnant wives or young children. Many have experienced profound loss and trauma during this time, including deaths, relationship breakdowns and time that they can never recover. At the same time they have been placed in conditions where they are indefinitely exposed to danger, denied freedom and made to feel unsafe.